People officially say “LOL” out loud

According to the Oxford English Dictionary, "LOL" isn't just a widely used …

The venerable Oxford English Dictionary has long been the definitive reference work on the English language. This week, it lent the majesty of its name to “LOL" (laughing out loud), a shiny new entry which will now join OMG, IMHO, TMI, BFF, and other linguistic "initialisms" in the dictionary. And why not? It's a perfectly cromulent word.

LOL is defined as an interjection, “originally and chiefly in the language of electronic communications: ‘ha ha!’; used to draw attention to a joke or humorous statement, or to express amusement.”

The real surprise here isn't the online ubiquity of LOL but its growing offline presence as a spoken word. As this week's announcement makes clear, LOL is now "found outside of electronic contexts, however; in print, and even in spoken use, where there often seems to be a bit more than simple abbreviation going on. The intention is usually to signal an informal, gossipy mode of expression, and perhaps parody the level of unreflective enthusiasm or overstatement that can sometimes appear in online discourse, while at the same time marking oneself as an ‘insider’ au fait with the forms of expression associated with the latest technology."

The hallmark of the Oxford English Dictionary is the way it illustrates word use over time through the use of quotations. In the case of LOL, the earliest quote that the editors could find comes from the comp.misc Usenet newsgroup on June 13, 1990, where it was included in a “Jargon File Draft” (and was therefore already in use).

But a quote from the 2003 UK novel Freshers reminds us that common abbreviations like LOL can eventually migrate from the screen to our lips. Two characters in the book share this bit of dialogue:

“Wow, man! Are you, like, really from a council estate [a public housing project]?”

“Yep.”

“Lol! Awesome."

Working at Ars, where we rely heavily on digital communication tools like instant messaging, Internet relay chat, and e-mail, comes with certain downsides. One is the tendency of online expressions like LOL to leap unbidden to our lips when away from the computer. I've personally felt LOL threaten to burst forth on occasion; it may have once even escaped my lips. Not because I was trying to be an "insider au fait" so much as because, after typing it so many times in response to my too-witty colleagues, it became an almost hard-wired, instinctual reaction to comedy.

The urge to "LOL" in public was an embarrassing one, and yet—what's so highbrow about shouting "ha-HA," anyway? Where some see linguistic decline, it's probably more accurate simply to see linguistic changes, changes that have piled into English over the last 500 years from so many cultures, languages, and communities that it's now one of the world's richest languages.

But even if you accept this view and make peace with "LOL" as a spoken word, one problem remains. Is it pronounced "loll" or "lole" or "ell-oh-ell"?

Way back in the day, we used to say them out loud on purpose just to be funny/stupid, like a joke making fun of other people who tried to pronounce them... like rofl (like waffle, except with an 'r') and lol (like doll but 'l' instead of 'd') and pwn (we laughed especially hard when we first heard it spoken and not a joke).

What's sad is that you can actually say ell-oh-ell or you can just actually, you know... laugh. I think it's more of an indication that people are spending more time online (well... texting and twitting and such) than off and those thought processes are bleeding over into 'real' social skills (and basically stunting them, IMO).

It's an abbreviation. Why on earth would you actually say it like it was a word? The only thing more obnoxious than saying it is typing it as "lawl", which makes absolutely no sense and just sounds stupid. Typing it, fine. Verbally, oh I don't know.. I'd actually laugh if it was funny.

I don't think I've heard anyone (other than Monk) say "LOL" out loud, but if I were so inclined, I would pronounce the letters - ell oh ell. (And then I'd send my life savings to the RIAA as a charitable donation, and then deliberately slam one of my more sensitive body parts in a desk drawer to see what it feels like.)

A few people I know have started using "IDK" in spoken conversations, again pronouncing the individual letters, eye dee kay. Maybe it's just a fad...

I've done this once, while mocking the most idiotic person I've ever met. I LOLed out loud as a joke, harmless right? Took an IQ test the next day, 87. I used to be a member of the triple nine society...

Senator Harry Reid needs to get on this... LOLing is a very serious issue.

While talking with coworkers earlier this week I said IMO out loud (i.e. I said "eye-moe"). I say it to my partner all the time, so didn't think anything of it. My coworker just looked at me and said in disbelief, "Did you just say IMO in life?!?"

It is only acceptable when being ironic, and then, only in moderation. For people who use it without irony or sarcasm...well, let's just say that I have a genetics laboratory in my basement dedicated to implementing human sexual dimorphism for the sole reason of converting any females who do this to males so that they will have the appropriate "equipment" for genital fisticuffs.

It's an abbreviation. Why on earth would you actually say it like it was a word? The only thing more obnoxious than saying it is typing it as "lawl", which makes absolutely no sense and just sounds stupid. Typing it, fine. Verbally, oh I don't know.. I'd actually laugh if it was funny.

RADAR, SONAR, SCUBA, etc. The silly part about it is that its an abbreviation used to describe an action in a text format. Saying "LOL" out loud is basically the equivalent of telling someone "I am singing you a song." instead of just singing a song or saying "I am doing cartwheels" instead of actually doing cartwheels.

And it's not any different than OK (okay), which stemmed from "oll korrect" (all correct) in the 1800's and is in perfectly common use today in both the acronym form and the spelled-out form (I'm sure there's a term for that).

We could have some sort of recursive acronym forming here, where LOL = LOL Out Loud. Like Hofstadter's GOD = GOD Over Djinn.

loll'in rhymes with Ballin - for those of you who can't freaking pronounce a three letter word. And yes, it's a word that can be used out loud - 'cept i tend to only use it around the people I play Starcraft with.

Wow, I don't think people here really get it. Most of you make it sound like people are saying lol instead of actually laughing at something funny. I've never used it like that. That would be like saying "laugh" instead of actually doing that (should we make fun of the word laugh?). Think of it more as a description of an act. You were online in a game/chat and saw/read something funny so a bunch of you loled at the person. I've also seen it used more sarcastically when someone says something that isn't actually fun, so you respond with lol. Maybe in vent someone says something funny, so you chuckle to yourself and respond with lol over vent. Its funny, so you want to let the person know you laughed but don't want to hold down the talk button and laugh, so you let them know you laughed by saying lol. You could also say, "holy crap the made me laugh", really all the same.